The Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell has served as senior pastor of Windsor Village United Methodist Church in Houston, TX since 1982. During that time the church has grown from around twenty-five active members to over 18,000. Recently, the Rev. Caldwell was asked, by the United Methodist News Service, "What makes Windsor Village a vital congregation?" He answered: When I came in 1982, I shared with the administrative council then that we were going to do three things, and we’re still Read More …
Youth Minister/Director as Advocate (#0378)
Lars Rood is the Lead Youth Minister at the 4700 member Highland Park Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) and the author of the forthcoming book Youth Ministry on a Shoestring: How to do More with Less (2011). Recently, he blogged about youth ministry job descriptions. In contrast to the common expectations of job descriptions that emphasize either a youth director/minister's relational skills or programming and administrative skills, Rood proposes a third way: . . . I want to throw out Read More …
Baptist Dance Party Goes Viral (#0377)
Second Baptist Church in Houston, TX has over 53,000 members and some 22,000 people attend worship at one of their five locations on a typical weekend. This year more than 2,000 people affiliated with the church gathered at Discovery Glenn in the heart of Houston to participate in a flash mob with a purpose. The video of this event has gone viral with over 750,000 views to date. Writing for Church Marketing Sucks, Kevin D. Hendricks summarizes the effort: The video featured more Read More …
The Limits of Pragmatism (#0376)
Edith Guffey has spent her adult life in administrative roles with large organizations. After working for several years in student records and admissions at the University of Kansas, she found her home in the national setting of the United Church of Christ in 1991. Guffey initially served as the denomination's secretary, which included acting as the denomination's "chief statistician." In 1999 she was elected Associate General Minister, tasked as Read More …
Most Americans Now Favor Legal Gay Marriage (#0375)
According to Gallup's latest Values and Beliefs poll, conducted May 5-8, a majority of Americans (53%) now support equal marriage rights for same sex couples as for opposite sex couples. This graph below shows how opinions have changed over time, with the single greatest percentage gain in marriage equality coming over the last year (9%). So What? For the first time ever, according to Gallup's poll, the majority of Americans now support marriage equality. When one Read More …
Job Seekers Should Go to Church (#0374)
"Need Job? Try Church" is not a paid advertisement, an evangelistic effort, or a government sponsored initiative. It is the title of Dennis Nishi's May 15 Wall Street Journal article, which suggests: Across the nation, local churches and other religious organizations have stepped up their recession-busting efforts with free career workshops, résumé clinics and networking functions. The latter can generate quick leads if leveraged properly since religious-centered networks Read More …
Technology and the Church: Crisis or Opportunity (#0373)
Lisa Miller is the author of Heaven: Our Enduring Fascination with the Afterlife (2010), and formerly served as religion editor at Newsweek. She recently wrote "My Take: how technology could bring down the church," for CNN's Belief Blog. In this article Miller argues that the printing press was the key technology that enabled the success of the Protestant Reformation and the current move away from print editions of the Bible to digital ones like YouVersion may enable Read More …
Classroom Conversations Go the Way of Social Media (#0372)
Trip Gabriel's recent New York Times article, "Speaking Up in Class, Silently, Using Social Media," explores the uses of backchannels (real-time online dialogue about a speaker or topic) in the classroom. While backchannels are being utilized at all levels of education - from elementary schools to graduate degree programs - the overall adoption rates are low. Those who leverage this new interactive supplement to the learning experience employ a variety of means including Twitter, Read More …
Review of God Is Not a Christian (#0371)
Meet the Author and Editor The Most Rev. Dr. Desmond Tutu was the first black person to serve as General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches and the first to serve as Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, South Africa. Tutu is best known for his tireless and effective work to end apartheid. He received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984, the Albert Schweitzer Prize for Humanitarianism in 1986, the Gandhi Peace Prize in 2005, and Read More …
Another Day When the World Didn’t End (#0370)
Harold Camping has been in the news the last several days thanks to his prediction (and his organization's costly campaign to alert the world) that the rapture will occur today at 6:00 p.m. in all time zones. Writing for the Chicago Tribune, Manya A. Brachear explains: Don't mark your calendars yet. Reports that the world will end Saturday are greatly exaggerated, according to many evangelical Christian scholars. For starters, California radio host Harold Camping, 89, president Read More …